Villette
docile. It was pretty to see her bid good-night; her manner to Graham
was touched with dignity: in her very slight smile and quiet bow spoke
the Countess, and Graham could not but look grave, and bend responsive.
I saw he hardly knew how to blend together in his ideas the dancing
fairy and delicate dame.
Next day, when we were all assembled round the breakfast-table,
shivering and fresh from the morning’s chill ablutions, Mrs. Bretton
pronounced a decree that nobody, who was not forced by dire necessity,
should quit her house that day.
Indeed, egress seemed next to impossible; the drift darkened the lower
panes of the casement, and, on looking out, one saw the sky and air
vexed and dim, the wind and snow in angry conflict. There was no fall
now, but what had already descended was torn up from the earth, whirled
round by brief shrieking gusts, and cast into a hundred fantastic
forms.
The Countess seconded Mrs. Bretton.
“Papa shall not go out,” said she, placing a seat for herself beside
her father’s arm-chair. “I will look after him. You won’t go into town,
will you, papa?”
“Ay, and No,” was the answer. “If you and Mrs. Bretton are _very_ good
to me, Polly—kind, you know, and attentive; if you pet me in a very
nice manner, and make much of me, I may possibly be induced to wait an
hour after breakfast and see whether this razor-edged wind settles.
But, you see, you give me no breakfast; you offer me nothing: you let
me starve.”
“Quick! please, Mrs. Bretton, and pour out the coffee,” entreated
Paulina, “whilst I take care of the Count de Bassompierre in other
respects: since he grew into a Count, he has needed _so_ much
attention.”
She separated and prepared a roll.
“There, papa, are your ‘pistolets’ charged,” said she. “And there is
some marmalade, just the same sort of marmalade we used to have at
Bretton, and which you said was as good as if it had been conserved in
Scotland—”
“And which your little ladyship used to beg for my boy—do you remember
that?” interposed Mrs. Bretton. “Have you forgotten how you would come
to my elbow and touch my sleeve with the whisper, ‘Please, ma’am,
something good for Graham—a little marmalade, or honey, or jam?’”
“No, mamma,” broke in Dr. John, laughing, yet reddening; “it surely was
not so: I could not have cared for these things.”
“Did he or did he not, Paulina?”
“He liked them,” asserted Paulina.
“Never blush for it, John,” said Mr. Home, encouragingly. “I like them
myself yet, and always did. And Polly showed her sense in catering for
a friend’s material comforts: it was I who put her into the way of such
good manners—nor do I let her forget them. Polly, offer me a small
slice of that tongue.”
“There, papa: but remember you are only waited upon with this
assiduity; on condition of being persuadable, and reconciling yourself
to La Terrasse for the day.”
“Mrs. Bretton,” said the Count, “I want to get rid of my daughter—to
send her to school. Do you know of any good school?”
“There is Lucy’s place—Madame Beck’s.”
“Miss Snowe is in a school?”
“I am a teacher,” I said, and was rather glad of the opportunity of
saying this. For a little while I had been feeling as if placed in a
false position. Mrs. Bretton and son knew my circumstances; but the
Count and his daughter did not. They might choose to vary by some
shades their hitherto cordial manner towards me, when aware of my grade
in society. I spoke then readily: but a swarm of thoughts I had not
anticipated nor invoked, rose dim at the words, making me sigh
involuntarily. Mr. Home did not lift his eyes from his breakfast-plate
for about two minutes, nor did he speak; perhaps he had not caught the
words—perhaps he thought that on a confession of that nature,
politeness would interdict comment: the Scotch are proverbially proud;
and homely as was Mr. Home in look, simple in habits and tastes, I have
all along intimated that he was not without his share of the national
quality. Was his a pseudo pride? was it real dignity? I leave the
question undecided in its wide sense. Where it concerned me
individually I can only answer: then, and always, he showed himself a
true-hearted gentleman.
By nature he was a feeler and a thinker; over his emotions and his
reflections spread a mellowing of melancholy; more than a mellowing: in
trouble and bereavement it became a cloud. He did not know much about
Lucy Snowe; what he knew, he did not very accurately comprehend: indeed
his misconceptions of my character often made me smile; but he saw my
walk in life lay rather on the shady side of the hill: he gave me
credit for doing my endeavour to keep the course honestly straight; he
would have helped me if he could: having no opportunity of helping, he
still wished me well. When he did look at me, his eye was kind; when he
did speak, his voice was benevolent.
“Yours,” said he, “is an arduous calling. I wish you health and
strength to win in it—success.”
His fair little daughter did not take the information quite so
composedly: she fixed on me a pair of eyes wide with wonder—almost with
dismay.
“Are you a teacher?” cried she. Then, having paused on the unpalatable
idea, “Well, I never knew what you were, nor ever thought of asking:
for me, you were always Lucy Snowe.”
“And what am I now?” I could not forbear inquiring.
“Yourself, of course. But do you really teach here, in Villette?”
“I really do.”
“And do you like it?”
“Not always.”
“And why do you go on with it?”
Her father looked at, and, I feared, was going to check her; but he
only said, “Proceed, Polly, proceed with that catechism—prove yourself
the little wiseacre you are. If Miss Snowe were to blush and look
confused, I should have to bid you hold your tongue; and you and I
would sit out the present meal in some disgrace; but she only smiles,
so push her hard, multiply the cross-questions. Well, Miss Snowe, why
do you go on with it?”
“Chiefly, I fear, for the sake of the money I get.”
“Not then from motives of pure philanthropy? Polly and I were clinging
to that hypothesis as the most lenient way of accounting for your
eccentricity.”
“No—no, sir. Rather for the roof of shelter I am thus enabled to keep
over my head; and for the comfort of mind it gives me to think that
while I can work for myself, I am spared the pain of being a burden to
anybody.”
“Papa, say what you will, I pity Lucy.”
“Take up that pity, Miss de Bassompierre; take it up in both hands, as
you might a little callow gosling squattering out of bounds without
leave; put it back in the warm nest of a heart whence it issued, and
receive in your ear this whisper. If my Polly ever came to know by
experience the uncertain nature of this world’s goods, I should like
her to act as Lucy acts: to work for herself, that she might burden
neither kith nor kin.”
“Yes, papa,” said she, pensively and tractably. “But poor Lucy! I
thought she was a rich lady, and had rich friends.”
“You thought like a little simpleton. _I_ never thought so. When I had
time to consider Lucy’s manner and aspect, which was not often, I saw
she was one who had to guard and not be guarded; to act and not be
served: and this lot has, I imagine, helped her to an experience for
which, if she live long enough to realize its full benefit, she may yet
bless Providence. But this school,” he pursued, changing his tone from
grave to gay: “would Madame Beck admit my Polly, do you think, Miss
Lucy?”
I said, there needed but to try Madame; it would soon be seen: she was
fond of English pupils. “If you, sir,” I added, “will but take Miss de
Bassompierre in your carriage this very afternoon, I think I can answer
for it that Rosine, the portress, will not be very slow in answering
your ring; and Madame, I am sure, will put on her best pair of gloves
to come into the salon to receive you.”
“In that case,” responded Mr. Home, “I see no sort of necessity there
is for delay. Mrs. Hurst can send what she calls her young lady’s
‘things’ after her; Polly can settle down to her horn-book before
night; and you, Miss Lucy, I trust, will not disdain to cast an
occasional eye upon her, and let me know, from time to time, how she
gets on. I hope you approve of the arrangement, Countess de
Bassompierre?”
The Countess hemmed and hesitated. “I thought,” said she, “I thought I
had finished my education—”
“That only proves how much we may be mistaken in our thoughts. I hold a
far different opinion, as most of these will who have been auditors of
your profound knowledge of life this morning. Ah, my little girl, thou
hast much to learn; and papa ought to have taught thee more than he has
done! Come, there is nothing for it but to try Madame Beck; and the
weather seems settling, and I have finished my breakfast—”
“But, papa!”
“Well?”
“I see an obstacle.”
“I don’t at all.”
“It is enormous, papa; it can never be got over; it is as large as you
in your greatcoat, and the snowdrift on the top.”
“And, like that snowdrift, capable of melting?”
“No! it is of too—too solid flesh: it is just your own self. Miss Lucy,
warn Madame Beck not to listen to any overtures about taking me,
because, in the end, it would turn out that she would have to take papa
too: as he is so teasing, I will just tell tales about him. Mrs.
Bretton and all of you listen: About five years ago, when I was twelve
years old, he took it into his head that he was spoiling me; that I was
growing unfitted for the world, and I don’t know what, and nothing
would serve or satisfy him, but I must go to school. I cried, and so
on; but M. de Bassompierre proved hard-hearted, quite firm and flinty,
and to school I went. What was the result? In the most admirable
manner, papa came to school likewise: every other day he called to see
me. Madame Aigredoux grumbled, but it was of no use; and so, at last,
papa and I were both, in a manner, expelled. Lucy can just tell Madame
Beck this little trait: it is only fair to let her know what she has to
expect.”
Mrs. Bretton asked Mr. Home what he had to say in answer to this
statement. As he made no defence, judgment was given against him, and
Paulina triumphed.
But she had other moods besides the arch and naïve. After breakfast;
when the two elders withdrew—I suppose to talk over certain of Mrs.
Bretton’s business matters—and the Countess, Dr. Bretton, and I, were
for a short time alone together—all the child left her; with us, more
nearly her companions in age, she rose at once to the little lady: her
very face seemed to alter; that play of feature, and candour of look,
which, when she spoke to her father, made it quite dimpled and round,
yielded to an aspect more thoughtful, and lines distincter and less
_mobile_.
No doubt Graham noted the change as well as I. He stood for some
minutes near the window, looking out at the snow; presently he
approached the hearth, and entered into conversation, but not quite
with his usual ease: fit topics did not seem to rise to his lips; he
chose them fastidiously, hesitatingly, and consequently infelicitously:
he spoke vaguely of Villette—its inhabitants, its notable sights and
buildings. He was answered by Miss de Bassompierre in quite womanly
sort; with intelligence, with a manner not indeed wholly
disindividualized: a tone, a glance, a gesture, here and there, rather
animated and quick than measured and stately, still recalled little
Polly; but yet there was so fine and even a polish, so calm and
courteous a grace, gilding and sustaining these peculiarities, that a
less sensitive man than Graham would not have ventured to seize upon
them as vantage points, leading to franker intimacy.
Yet while Dr. Bretton continued subdued, and, for him, sedate, he was
still observant. Not one of those petty impulses and natural breaks